


i dreamt about you last night

by Gone_by_dawn



Series: 100 ways to say... criminal minds [7]
Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Comfort, Fluff, Innocence, Innuendo, M/M, Self-Indulgent, Spencer is coded as having asd, Team as Family, The BAU as a family, fuck canon cuz the timeline is all over the place on this one, reid just literally doesn’t get social cues half the time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-31
Updated: 2019-03-31
Packaged: 2019-11-07 09:49:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17958215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gone_by_dawn/pseuds/Gone_by_dawn
Summary: Reid finds out the hard way that telling someone they made an appearance in your subconscious mind while you were sleeping may not be appropriate for work. Coincidentally, he also finds out this his teammates are childish, to say the least.





	i dreamt about you last night

**Author's Note:**

> i don't have an excuse for how late this is other than the fact that I'm a liar and I knew the regular updates thing was wishful thinking

The BAU team had been without a case for 4 hours now, which was surely some kind of record in the office. Of course, the agents still had mounds of paperwork and case write-ups to go through and, when that never-ending pile was finished, a couple of years worth of cold cases that needed looking into. Collectively, they decided that this free time was best spent catching up on things going on outside of their work. Which was how they landed on their current topic of discussion.

"-we're all blackout drunk.  _I_ end up at a McDonalds, with no idea how I got there, and no idea where I even am. Eventually, someone calls me a ride, but I can't remember the hotel I'm staying at so we just drive around for 20 minutes before he drops me off somewhere and tells me to figure it out," Morgan was saying, vividly recounting his trip to Florida to the amusement of his coworkers. Prentiss shook her head, unbelieving. He raised an eyebrow, daring her. "What, you calling me a liar?"

"Yes," she said, plainly. Derek smirked.

"Whatever. I'm sure your day off was just as crazy." He turns, catching Spencer's eye. His smirk widens. "How 'bout you, Reid? What'd you get up to this weekend?"

The doctor shrugged.“Me? Nothing much. Reread the Odyssey, played a few games of chess with my friend." He paused. " **I dreamt about you last night** ,” he said, aiming for nonchalance. It seemed to have been working, except that Derek had gone completely still.

“What?”

A chorus of snickers came from the surrounding agents. JJ hissed “ _Reid_ ,” but beside her Emily was laughing, and the two signals were conflicting. A dreadful thing when social cues were already so difficult to pick up. “You cant _say_ things like that.”

Reid immediately went to apologize, frowning. He wasn't sure which part of what he'd said had been offensive but he felt bad about it. Before he could even manage to stammer out the ' _I'm sorry'_  though, he was dismissed by Morgan who smiled, good-naturedly. He always tried to smile his way out of things.

Morgan chuckled and waved the whole thing off, like it was no big deal. His expression was a perfect imitation of humored indifference, but it faltered just slightly at his eyes. Reid could see the moment where he went to say something, rethought, and went again. There was a spilt second of hesitation, then: "Guess now I can literally say ' _In your dreams'_ , huh?" 

There was an immediate surprised uproar among the agents. Rossi beat them all to the punchline, looking _gleeful_ and downright sinister.

"Thank you for sharing with the class," he said, practically beaming. He was focused on Spencer, who squirmed under the intensity of mischief in his eyes. "Although, if we don't ask, you didn't have to tell. And trust me, kid, no one's asking what you do in bed."

"Be decent," said Hotch, and another round of laughs followed.  
  
Morgan coughed into a fist. He smiled again, (forced, because his eyes didn't do the crinkle that Reid always loved watching) but then quickly excused himself under the guise of going to talk to Garcia. As the man left (and, really, _retreated_  was the right word to use in this situation, but that would imply that he was running away from something, and Reid wasn’t able to put a finger on what, exactly, he’d be running from) he could’ve sworn he heard him say to Rossi something about being the death of him. An indiscernible thought tugged at him. He frowned. Had he been rude? He hadn’t meant to be. He didn't _think_ he had, because the agents seemed to be enjoying themselves, but that was definitely the wrong emotion from Morgan. He surveyed the room again. JJ looked somewhat exasperated. Rossi and Emily were both grinning, in the way that he’d come to realize meant that they were poking fun at his expense. Hotch, from where he stood a little ways off to the side, was almost-smiling fondly, shaking his head. It took him a minute to connect the dots. He mentally replayed the entire conversation from a minute ago. Then: _oh_. What he’d said, about the dream—they were making it dirty. His cheeks got warm. He didn’t blush, though, mind. Over his years at the BAU, he’d too often been the subject of jokes, especially inappropriate or sex-related jokes because people seemed to think that he was uncomfortable or unfamiliar with the concept. _Far_ too often to blush that easily. But still.

“I didn’t mean-“ he started, to no avail. They weren’t listening, too busy laughing at his defensiveness to really care for an explanation. The one who he’d meant to say it to wasn’t there, anyway. Accepting defeat, he met the team with an indulgent pout, turning pointedly back to his work. “I work with actual children,” he muttered, petulantly and very childlike himself, much to the delight of the other agents. Emily was practically howling with laughter. JJ was close to tears. _Children,_ he thought.

A hand came up to his shoulder, patting it sympathetically. Another one, a woman's, ruffled his hair. He refused to look up at any of them right now.

Derek came back a few minutes later, a more natural smile in place and his charisma turned all the way up. The team had mostly disbanded and put the incident behind them, because they were nothing if not efficient when it came to gossip, but he did get one faint wolf-whistle from an unidentified source (Luke). Reid visibly rolled his eyes in the man's direction but Luke's wide smile was far from intimidated. Morgan walked past them all and came to a stop at Reid's desk. 

"I'm sorry for the way I phrased things," he started, awkward and slow. His hands were doing the  _thing_ where they bent and tumbled around without grace or sense and Derek forcefully reminded himself that he shouldn't stare. It was an uphill battle. 

"Don't worry about it, kid," He said.

Reid didn't frown. He didn't, and he knew he didn't because he'd been frowning earlier and this wasn't it. What he did do, though, was purse his lips slightly and tuck them into the corner of his mouth, drawing his eyebrows together. It wasn’t a frown and it wasn’t a pout, either, but it _was_ some bizarre mix of the two that probably should’ve looked more petulant than it did.

”How young do you think I am?” Spencer asked, _demanded_ , suddenly, and Morgan had not been ready for this line of questioning.

”What?” He asked, dumbly. This wasn’t the right answer.

“You keep calling me kid,” was all the other man said out loud, but it wasn’t the end of his sentence. Spencer has bitten his lip to stop the rest of it.

A little too late, Derek had remembered the last time Spencer had spoken up against the name. He’d just summoned the courage to ask him to dinner and Derek had been focused on getting him to say yes, not even blinking when the word slipped off his tongue. It wasn’t unusual for him to call people by nicknames, especially not Reid, but the younger man had bristled for a moment and stated very matter-of-factly that the two were practically the same age which hadn’t been Derek’s _point_ so he hadn’t addressed it then. He kind of didn’t want to address it now either, but this was the battle Spencer was picking and he wasn’t the one making the rules.

”You _are_ a kid,” Morgan said, which _definitely_ wasn’t the right answer. Spencer glared. “And Rossi calls you kid all the time, so why-“

” _Rossi’s_ a lot older than me,” Spencer interrupted.

”Reid, I-“

”Was born June 6, 1973, eight years before my birth in 1981. It’s not that much of a difference, Morgan.”

In the back of his mind, Derek realized that he’d approached Reid for reasons so incredibly far from this. He wasn’t sure how they’d gotten so off track. He wasn’t used to arguments getting this derailed, which, maybe, was his fault for being unprepared. He didn’t mention this. Instead, he said, “Why is this such a big deal to you?”

Spencer was quiet for a moment as he sat back in his chair. Neither of the two had seemed to realize when he’d leaned in so much, or when the other agents had subtly excused themselves from the bull pen. Right now it was just themselves in the room, staring at each other intently for different reasons, Reid with his arms crossed, Morgan with his eyes narrowed. There was a lot of tension in the now-empty room.

”I don’t want you to think of me as a kid,” he said finally, voice small. 

“Reid, no one here thinks of you as a kid. We mess around with you a lot, but everyone knows that you are more than capable of handling yourself-“

”I don’t want _you_ to think of me as a kid.”

Derek frowned and tried for a minute to find the distinction. It was an important difference for Spencer, which meant he needed to understand—oh. Was this-? He didn’t want to jump to conclusions, but his heart hammered in his chest.

”Are you,” he asked, but he didn’t know the rest of the question. Or if he did, he couldn’t ask it.

Spencer licked his lips. Not seductively, but out of nervousness, and Derek was comforted by the heat beginning to show behind the other man’s cheeks. 

“It’s important to me,” Spencer said slowly, voice barely above a mumble, “that you don’t think of me as a child. I’m an adult, and I’m about your age, and I’m capable of deciding things for myself.”

”I know that,” Derek said. _His_ voice was hoarse. What a pair they made, both suddenly losing the ability to talk normally, even when alone. Especially when alone.

Reid blushed, properly, and leaned back, and again Derek hadn’t noticed that they’d both leaned in. He missed the closeness.

”And about what I said earlier, the dream, I really hadn’t meant it that way, but I see now how-“

”What was I doing in the dream?” He asked, rather than let Spencer talk himself into a frenzy. 

Reid smiled, hesitantly. “Same thing you do outide it,” he said. “Beating up bad guys, saving the day.”

”Yeah?” Derek smiled too. “And where were you?”

”I was more or less a damsel in distress.”

”Reid, you're not-“ he started, but was waved off.

”Oh don’t, it was fine. I was being held captive by Smoag who had considered me part of his hoard and you and JJ were trying to break into his lair and get me back. I think you might’ve killed Smoag in the dream but not before-“

Derek folded his arms across his chest and settled into a more comfortable position leaning across the other’s desk. Spencer kept going, explaining the wild and intricate details of his dream, which had apparently involved a few members of the team joining forces in Middle Earth. He zoned out after barely a minute, content to listen to Spencer’s ramblings as he studied the genius fondly.

The rest of the team, who maybe hadn’t disappeared as much as Morgan and Reid had thought, watched from the conference room. Not that they were spying, of course—only Prentiss was trained in the art of espionage—but they weren’t exactly _not_ spying either. They’d removed themselves from the pen and continued their talking elsewhere, tuning back into the soon-to-be couple when the conversation lulled. A bet had been taken up after a few minutes of observation on whether or not the two pining idiots would kiss. It had looked promising for a good while, but ultimately Rossi had won, accepting the money and bragging rights with a grin.

”You do know I’m practically the expert on getting together, right?” he teased, delighted by the withering glare Emily spared him. “I’m just saying, after the third wedding, you learn a thing or two.”

"You're cheating," Garcia accused, playfully suspicious. 

"No cheating," he promised. "I just happen to be a good profiler."

The agents protested and even Hotch laughed when Emily told him exactly where Rossi could shove his profiling. Smiles and insults were passed around the room while Spencer and Derek made goo-goo eyes at each other from the floor below. All in all it was a good day at the BAU. Days without cases could be fun.

**Author's Note:**

> sorry it’s late and also expect everything to be late because I have no self motivation. I appreciate you reading though and pls drop a comment :)


End file.
